One Man Drinking Games
by CitronPresse
Summary: -- You're hypocritical, you hear her say. And slutty! You've been hearing the words all day. -- Mark gets very drunk and experiences a wave of regret. Spoilers up to / set 6.16. Characters: Mark, some Callie; pairing: Mark/Lexie implied.


Written (a while ago) for the un_love_you challenge on livejournal, prompt #12 "I'm drunk"

* * *

You're drunk. Well, you're pretty sure you are.

You can barely lift your head off the table, and everything swims and sways in front of your eyes when you try to squint at the shape next to you that you think might be Callie.

Yeah, it feels like being drunk. You just don't know how you got from the first scotch (at least you think that's how it started) to the wasted swamp of inertia that's the best description you have right now for your mind and your body. Although, where one ends and other begins, you don't really know, because every time you try to think a coherent thought, the effort reminds you that you're feeling kind of sick. (You should probably try to work out where the bathroom is. But that would require knowing which way is up.)

_You're hypocritical_, you hear her say. _And slutty!_ You've been hearing the same words all day, loudest each time you slid your hand inside the next screwable woman's panties.

A sort of laugh rises of its own accord in your throat, not quite making it past your lips, maybe because they feel like rubber, or maybe because your heart's not really in it. But you have to admit the nursing staff's eagerness to screw you today was convenient. You hadn't realized they were all waiting in line. Your currency must've gone up while you were doing the monogamous, fatherly thing. So many women, so little . . .

Shit, you're really feeling sick now. You belch up something that tastes more like tequila than scotch. (Why the hell would you drink tequila? You hate the stuff at the best of times, and now the remembered flavor nearly pushes you over the edge.) There's too much saliva in your mouth, and a series of hiccups jerks at your insides, each one churning up your stomach a little more threateningly. But it dies down, without you disgracing yourself all over Joe's (you think . . . or someone else's, who the fuck knows?) floor.

"How're you doing?" The Callie shape moves closer, blurrily just shy of focused, but enough for you to see dark brown eyes. The voice is definitely hers, unmistakable from the deep, soft patience: the one person who still talks to you that way.

". . . so little time," you slur, then ask, "Huh?" confused, partly because you don't have a clear idea of what thought you just finished, partly because she asked you a question and you've already forgotten what it was.

"You want to go home?"

You shake your head, and twist sideways on the chair to get a head-on view of her. "'S fine," you say, straining stupidly hard to get the meager words to come out right. "I'll just sleep here." You let your head fall back on the table top, grateful that your arms are there to break the thud, keeping your eyes more or less open so she knows you're still talking to her. "I'm slutty," you mumble, not quite sure why, except it seems to be the only thought in your head.

"Well, I'm not gonna argue the point with you." She lowers her face nearer to your level. "But if you're counting on anyone letting you be slutty with them tomorrow, I think you should probably go home before you pass out or puke. 'Cause this?" The sympathy in her voice gives way to amusement, maybe a little frustration. "Not good publicity for your burning hot love skills. Or the Head of Plastics thing you've got going on the side, if that still matters to you."

"Sr'sly. 'S fine." You shrug. "Don't wanna fuck anyone else tonight." You try to smirk. "Screwed five nurses and . . . " You can't remember; someone Derek got pissed at you about. Addison, maybe? She still seems to get him all riled up, even though he got _his_ Grey, and the life he wanted. So . . . except it _wasn't_ Addison. It was . . . oh, yeah! ". . .and a drug rep called . . .?" But you have no fucking idea what she was called. She was there, that's all. If the lawsuit Derek yelled about happens, you guess you'll find out her name then.

(There's only one name you care about. The one that's yoked to the _slutty_ thought you can't forget. The one that used to think she loved you, and now probably hates you almost as much as you're beginning to remember you hate yourself.)

The sex was supposed to block everything out. All the bad stuff.

It backfired.

Which, you recall now, is when the drinking started: the time-honored drowning of sorrows.)

Hiccups stab through your diaphragm and chest again, dragging a wave of acid nausea in their wake that you have to swallow down hard. (You certainly feel like you're drowning. Your sorrows, on the other hand, are doing just fine.)

"I told her I couldn't look at her," you admit, losing track of yourself in the swaying room. "So fucking dumb." _I can't even look at you right now_.

"Well, yeah," Callie agrees, but softens the bluntness with a soothing tone of voice. "So maybe we should leave, huh? Before you do something even dumber."

It's the last thing you know until you're kneeling on the sticky bathroom floor, hugging the toilet, heaving up the contents of your stomach. (It turns out the bar is Joe's after all. You recognize the permanent stain in the corner by the wall. You were staring at it earlier today while you banged a nurse: a sort of lunch break between the woman you did before her in the on-call room and your 2 o'clock labyrinthectomy.)

"God," you groan when it's over, hauling yourself against the wall, drawing your knees up to your chest. You sit still for a moment, not really able to move, one hand pacifying your gut, the other shielding your eyes against the light and Callie's caring, then peer through your fingers, testing your vision and her tolerance, suddenly conscious of what you're putting her through. "I'm sorry."

"It's fine," she shrugs. "What friends are for. But now, seriously, you need to go home."

"Before I do something dumber?" Although, honestly, it's hard to know what could be dumber than everything you've already done.

Life wasn't supposed to go this way. You had plans. Better ones than this cyclical excuse for a fallback that meets every low expectation you ever had. And, sure, you can tell yourself that everything got taken away, and you can't help the way you're acting. But there's a kind of clarity that comes with a raw, purged stomach and a mind that's still just drunk enough not to make excuses. A kind of searing clarity that makes it so obvious it hurts, that's what's killing you, what's reducing you to this, is the one plan you fucked up all by yourself.

"She's right," you sigh, "I'm hypocritical and slutty," wondering if Lexie would enjoy the quirk of fate. You think you'd wither up in shame if she got a look at you right now. But you'd give fucking anything to look at her the way you used to.


End file.
